Out and about

As the end of the program approaches school work is getting a bit more demanding, so I apologize for the long gaps in posting blogs. I'll make it up with this one, it should be fun.

Last week we went to a pizzeria outside of Amelia with Salvatore (Monica's brother), Michele, and Thomaso. They are quite the entertaining group. You would think that we would get sick of pizza by now, but nope we are still loving it. It is nothing like pizza in the States, so that helps.

So, at dinner I may or may not have knocked my fork off of the table and had it land in my purse. ;-)

Lately we have been on a hold the camera out and take a picture kick. Here is Lindsey and I early on in the evening.

This dinner was particularly funny because Salvatore is like his sister Monica, and tries to get us to use Italian more. Unfortunately I may have made one of the biggest pronunciation mistakes of this summer. Salvatore was trying to figure out how to say sweep in english, so I looked it up in my dictionary and said the Italian word that was there to see if we had successfully matched the words. WELL... apparently I mispronounced it, and my mispronunciation made it quite a bad word, and I had said it quite loud. After the boys all made huge faces and tried to get us to stop saying the word, Emily and Kate said it trying to figure out what was going on. Remember, we think we are saying "to sweep."

Well... turns out I was saying the "f" word. Yep, to sweep and the other word are just one letter off. One tiny little letter!! So that was very funny!

Here are Emily and Salvatore with their nice faces. ;-)

One side of the table: Michele, Kate, Emily and Salvatore.

The other side.

The group!

After the group photo we handed our cameras over to the boys to get a photo of the ladies. As soon as they had the cameras in hand they started rapid fire taking pictures. Hence our funny faces, it was a funny thing to watch. So here you have photo 1.

Photo 2

Photo 3 there are more, but I picked the best so I wouldn't be throwing too many photos at you guys.

Below we are waiting in the parking lot to determine where to go next. This was on a Monday night, so we had 5 more days of class to go and we didn't want to do anything super crazy. Our options were:

1. Go dancing in Terni

2. Listen to live music about 5 minutes away

3. Go home and go to bed

We decided to go listen to music. You get no pictures of this because apparently ALL of the people aged 20-35 in Umbria were there, and I was NOT going to be the stereotypical tourist. :-) Sorry!

After the music we headed back to Amelia and convinced Michele to open the gelateria just for us. Here Lindsey is reclining on the bench.

Michele dishing out some yummy gelato for Salvatore and Kate.

Thomaso is enjoying his gelato.

as is Salvatore.

Kate decided that she wanted to scoop her own.

Another fun night in Amelia!

Ciao Ciao!

Medieval Nights - Complete with Tights! Part 2

Last weekend we went to a big Medieval dinner. The plan is that you start the dinner in one place, and then walk around the town to go to each of the courses. One of the things I LOVE about the organized dinners is that you get cups or wine glasses to take home. For this event we got these mugs that look like coffee cups without handles. Lindsey and I got ones that were rather dull, and Catherine and Ender got ones that were better... so we convinced them to switch. :-)

Ok, so this is what the street looks like since it has been decorated for the festivals.

This is the exit gate from the dinner. The best part about the dinner was that cars could not come into the walled city until it was over. It was nice to walk around and not have to jump into doorways when a car would come. 

This is the entrance. When the dinner was starting everyone was packed in here waiting to get in to pay for dinner. There were men in medieval dress with spears that would only let small groups in at a time. Lindsey, Michelle and I got stuck between the 3 men (they were like a triangle around us). They were pretty funny. 

I like the extent they go to decorating things. They covered up the street signs with paper. :-)

This is the shield of the Crux Burgi contrada, where first course was.

Here come the drummers! Sorry it's a bit blurry, but the photos don't come out so well with flash.

More drummers.

I don't know who the guy in the black and white is supposed to be, but he seemed pretty important.

They are going into where the first course is to make an announcement. 

This is the archaeological museum. You might remember it from the wine festival a while back. We have class right next to this, so we are here quite often. The guy in the white shirt with the cap is named Marco (as are his two best friends, yep, Marco, Marco, Marco) and he is the juggler for the evening.

They are waiting to give us our food and wine. 

The rest of the stops on the tour got a little crazy and a little crowded, so the photos did not come out too well. Let's just say that at the meat station there was a crowd, we waited for an hour because we realized there was no real exit. It was a lot of fun though.

Here we all are: Lindsey, Verity (our professor's really nice daughter), Isabel, Emily, Me, and Kate. Kate and Lindsey are modeling the mugs. 

Ciao Ciao!!! 

When the cat's away...

Perhaps the title should say when I am away from my cat? So... the other night while trying to figure out where to bring their trash they found a kitten. They brought it some salami and played with it a bit, and then went away. :-) 

The next day they told me about the kitten. Anyone that knows me knows that if there is a kitten/cat involved I immediately want to A) figure out how to catch and hold it and B) find it a home. So... Lindsey and I decided to catch the kitten (who was all alone by the way). It turns out that catching the kitten wasn't very hard. She wanted to be caught.

So here are some pictures of the beautiful kitten. She was brought "home" last night and is already litter trained, eating well, and quite cuddly! :-) Kate or Lindsey are going to bring her back to the states (yes Tasha, Nellie and Danielle, breathe a sigh of relief, I am not trying to get another cat). :-)

She doesn't have a name yet, but will soon.

So this weekend is our BIG art crime conference in Amelia. We have some amazingly distinguished speakers coming, such as: the Ex Mayor of Rome, representatives of the Carabinieri, the FBI, Scotland Yard, etc. It should be a lot of fun and very interesting, but it is ALL day (meaning 9:30am-midnight) on Saturday. Then on Sunday I move into a new apartment, so don't plan on hearing from me until next week. :-)

Coincidentally my MOM and SISTER and LUIS and CONNIE and CHRISSY come next week!! YAY!! I am super excited. So lots of fun stories to come!

Ciao Ciao!

The Whole Shebang

Ok, get ready for the longest blog ever. I am going to lump last week into one. I will try to be brief and entertaining. :-)

We are going to start at the Chalet. The Chalet is an outdoor bar in the park. Some of the girls and I will go to Zio Zeb pizza, order some pizzas and then walk over to the Chalet to enjoy a bottle of vino and the outdoors. I can't get over the location of the Chalet just yet. Europe is very diffent, case in point, the Chalet is positioned between two playgrounds and there are some toys AT the Chalet so that the children (we have seen infants to 13) that stay later than we do (we tend to leave around midnight) have something to play with.

Here is the actual bar. :-) We have got I would like a bottle of white/red wine with ___ glasses in Italian down pat. That's Lauren in the corner of the photo.

I have met two absolutely amazing people that I adore, John and Jane. John is in the program with me and Jane is his wife. They are, without a doubt, two of the most entertaining and kind people I have ever met. For instance, they are staying at a very nice palazzo (palace in Italian) and invited the entire class over for dinner one night. Here is a view of the backyard.

The food... oh the food. Jane is one of those people you wish you could be, but more than likely you'll never quite get it right. She and John run a business of their own, but oh no, she doesn't stop there, she is an amazing cook. She and her friend made all of the food for the dinner and I can say that I have never enjoyed an ENTIRE spread before in my life. Usually I will find one or two things I like, but not all. Not the case here, it was all delectable. 

The Palazzo is in the city walls of Amelia, and this is a view from the backyard.

So, the people that live and own the house are direct decendants of the original owner who was a Pope... or a Bishop... hmm... I'm going to have to look into that. Not a Pope... maybe a Cardinal? Maybe I should have waited to have my first glass of Prosecco until AFTER the tour.

The Palazzo is used as a B&B. In order to get a bathroom in one of the rooms, without affecting the structure of the home, they purchased this swanky piece and built a bathroom in it. SO neat!!

The view. I never get sick of these views and I hope you don't mind. They are not likely to stop anytime soon.

The Palazzo at night. I want a Palazzo. :-)

Suffice it to say that was my favorite night thus far. 

Next,  we went back to Crazy Johnny's (the place where we got the HUGE appetizer). It was just Lindsey, Lauren and I (I promise, I will start taking pictures of people soon) and Isabel and Michelle (two other friends) were at another table. 

Crazy Johnny's (that's not the actual name of the bar, I don't know the real name, but Johnny is the owner and he is crazy) is an experience in and of itself. The menu changes daily, so they don't print one... so you have to try to translate while listening to the waitress (NOT EASY). We have started asking for her notepad so we can read it. So we have had octopus here before, and weren't particularly wanting to have it again so we made sure not to order anything with Popoli in it... or so we thought.

Lauren and I ordered gnocchi and Lindsey ordered pan fried fish with basil... or did she? When her meal came out this is what she got:

A heaping bowl of baby octopi. YUUMMM!! I mean, they really do not taste bad. If you like fried squid (calamari) you'll like fried octopus. It's just the visual you have to get around.

So dinner was lovely and as we were wrapping up a huge group of handsome young men came in and sat at a few tables near ours. As we were getting ready to ask for the check (and finishing our 2nd bottle of wine... I'll help you do the math, 3 girls, 2 bottles) the boys sent over another bottle in exchange for a picture with their birthday boy. This is another example of, Amelians just like Americans. I can't imagine doing this in the States, walking up to a tourist and asking to take a picture with them, but it is always sweet and endearing. 

We took the picture and then started chatting. Amelia is a small town, and you know you are in a small town when you, as the outsider, start to make connections. Such as, our Italian Language teacher is apparently married to one of the guys that had been in the group, but left a little early. Turns out the group is the Amelian football (that's soccer for you American's) team and Monica's husband is the coach. I think Amelia could institute 2 degrees of separation and succeed easily.

To keep it short, we drank the third bottle of wine (only after enticing Isabel and our waitress to help), got another plate of fried octopus (the boys sent it over) and then dessert (the boys sent it over) then we went home.

A few days later we tried a pizza place that is quite a hike away, but has a view that is worth it. This is a picture of a house that we all claim we will own at some point in our lives.

This is a field of sunflowers. I cannot wait for them all to bloom. My mind cannot comprehend how beautiful that will be. 

View

The columns leading to the house we will all own one day. :-)

THE view. That is Amelia. It was an overcast day, so the pictures aren't as great as I would like, but you get the idea.

Nighttime view.

That's all for now! Ciao!